MLB Clubs Provide Financial Funds For Stadium Staff And Hungry People

Peanut vendors and fellow ballpark hawkers whose incomes disappeared when baseball stopped March 12 found a guardian angel Tuesday.

Actually, 30 guardian angels.

Each major-league team pledged to provide $1 million into a special fund to help vendors, concessionaires, ushers, and other stadium staff.

According to Commissioner of Baseball Rob Manfred, “Over the past 48 hours, I have been approached by representatives of all 30 clubs to help assist the thousands of ballpark employees affected by the delay in the start of the Major League Baseball season.

“Motivated by a desire to help some of the most valuable members of the baseball community, each club has committed $1 million. The individual clubs will be announcing more details surrounding this support effort in their local communities.”

The Toronto Blue Jays and Detroit Tigers had been the first teams to announce separate aid programs for baseball employees idled by the cancellation of spring training and indefinite postponement of Opening Day, which had been scheduled for March 26.

Details of how and when the funds will be distributed will be forthcoming on a team-by-team basis. Manfred explained why.

“The timing of these announcements will vary,” he said, “because of the need to coordinate with state and local laws as well as collective bargaining obligations in an effort to maximize the benefits realized by each group of employees.

“I am proud that our clubs came together so quickly and uniformly to support these individuals who provide so much to the game we love.”

Major League Baseball, in conjunction with the Players Association, had previously agreed to provide a $1 million to feed the hungry, especially children who normally receive meals at school. Many schools, like ballparks, are now shuttered by the COVID-19 outbreak.

The joint $1 million commitment will be split between Feeding America and Meals on Wheels America.

Individual players, including Hall of Famer Ferguson Jenkins and 2018 All-Star Game MVP Alex Bregman, are assisting on their own. Bregman and Astros teammate Lance McCullers Jr. are donating to the Houston Food Bank while the Anthony Rizzo Foundation is arranging for meals to be sent to medical staff, including doctors and nurses, at Ann & Robert H. Lure Children’s Hospital in Chicago.

Baseball’s charitable efforts show how people involved in the game will unite in time of crisis, according to Arizona Diamondbacks manager Torey Lovullo.

“It just speaks volumes about how even though we’re adversaries and even though we compete between the white lines, when something like this pops up, we rally around,” he said in a Tuesday conference call.

“It’s a way for us to come together and support everybody effected by this. I think it’s a pretty loud statement Major League Baseball made by showing this kind of support.“

Because the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) has asked that gatherings of more than 50 people be suspended for at least eight weeks, Major League Baseball has not announced a date for the rescheduled Opening Day. The CDC has also advocated social distances – a separation of at least six feet between individuals.

In baseball, where every player on a team touches the same ball, those suggestions hit home.